Splitshire: Even More Free Stock Photos for Commercial Use

Daniel Nanescu from Torino, Italy is a web and graphics designer as well as a passionate photographer. Traces of his photography can be tracked back almost ten years from now. Daniel does not only have a practiced eye. He also has the appropriate hardware as well as some solid photo editing skills – the whole package. All the better that he decided to publish parts of his work for free. Welcome to the brand-new service Splitshire.com. It’s merely a few days old…

Splitshire: Design matters

What immediately got me when I visited Splitshire for the first time, was the elegant, almost luxurious design of the service. Think of any given stock photo repository. The look of the site itself will not be the first thing you get impressed by. Of course it’s true, that a download repository needs a perfect user experience in terms of finding and downloading. Daniel shows us that we need not stop here. Practical resources are allowed to look beautiful, too.

Thematically Splitshire wants to cover a broad range. Since Daniel put Splitshire online only a few days ago, there shouldn’t be any wonder, that as of today the number of photos is fairly low. If I counted right, only two dozen pictures can be found. With a broad category range and only a few photos to start with, quite some categories are still empty. If you encounter an empty category, Nanescu asks you to support the project with PayPal Donate. You might as well invite him for a coffee, though. If you happen to be in Torino, that is.

If you are trying to find a definition for the name Splitshire, don’t count on me. I have never heard that word before and assume it to be some kind of coinage. Impress me in the comments, if I’m wrong.

Photos come in different resolutions from 12 megapixels upwards, with some being size-optimized for screen display. These are not exactly predestinated for print projects, though all photos are allowed to be used in web and print projects alike. There is no limit to what you can do despite the fact that you are not allowed to sell the photos themselves. What you create using them can be part of your private and more so your commercial projects.You need not even care for proper attribution, though Daniel appreciates it if you do.

It remains to be seen how much power Daniel will put into his little side project and if we will see Splitshire for a long time. Taking into account that Daniel’s career as a photographer already lasts for the better part of a decade, at least according to his web traces, I wouldn’t be too pessimistic. Add Splitshire.com to your bookmarks. There’s no reason not to…

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Dieter Petereit is Noupe's Editor-In-Chief and a veteran of the web with over 25 years of experience in the world of IT. As soon as Netscape became available he started to do what already at that time was called webdesign and has carried on ever since. Almost a decade ago he started writing for several online publications, some well, some lesser known. Dieter is a heavy G-Plusser, so why not meet him over there?